Terms of Service

By using and/or visiting our Site, whether or not you register you: (1) agree to be bound by these Terms of Service (“TOS”) (2) agree to our Privacy Policy, which is located at http://start2.occupyourhomes.org/privacy_policy and is incorporated here by reference; and (3) agree to be bound by other legal notices that may be posted on the Site from time to time. The legally binding terms of these documents set out your rights, obligations and restrictions regarding your use of our Site.

In order to participate in certain services you may be required to download content, software, and/or required to agree to additional terms and conditions. Unless otherwise expressly set forth in any such additional terms and conditions applicable to the specific Services in which you choose to participate, those additional terms are hereby incorporated into this TOS. If you do not agree to this TOS (which is comprised of these terms of use and our Privacy Policy) please do not use the Site. You are only authorized to use the Site if you agree to abide by all applicable laws and this TOS. The terms “we,” “us” and “Occupy Our Homes” refer to OccupyOurHomes.org, a project of Citizen Engagement Lab which sponsors and maintains this website. Anyone using, creating any petition through, posting any content on, or taking any action through or using this Site is referred to as “You,” ‘Your” or “User.”

1. Modification to TOS

We may change or update this TOS from time to time, and any such modifications shall be effective upon posting on the Site. Your use of our Site after a change has been posted signifies your TOS to any such changes. You should review this TOS periodically to make sure you are up to date on any changes.

2. Propriety and Intellectual Property Rights

All copyright and other rights in and to the computer programs, computer applications, web applications, database programs, web content files and all written, graphic, audio and audiovisual works incorporated into and utilized on the Site shall be and remain the sole and exclusive property of Occupy Our Homes (“Occupy Our Homes Intellectual Property”). You may not copy, modify, publish, transmit, distribute, perform, display, or sell any such Occupy Our Homes Intellectual Property, EXCEPT to download copies for your own personal use or for purposes of assisting with recruiting members or supporters, or participating in Occupy Our Homes activities and programs.

3. If You Create A Petition Through This Site

You acknowledge that: by using the Site and Service you may create and transmit through or on the Site written and/or visual/graphic work, and/or , data and other Users may create and/or transmit such works or data (all of the foregoing being collectively referred to as “User Content") including but not limited to the contents of online petitions (the “Petitions”) . Any person creating or transmitting User Content is referred to as a “User Content Provider.”

A. Use of Petitions. You understand that Occupy Our Homes has the right , in its sole discretion, but not the obligation, to select particular Petitions from among those submitted and place them on the Occupy Our Homes.org home page or send email to Occupy Our Homes supporters promoting your petition, but Occupy Our Homes is not obligated to feature, promote or publicize any particular Petition in any of these ways or in any other way. Further, we may contact you directly regarding your petition if, in our sole discretion, we believe that national attention should be given to your campaign.

B. Right to Reject or Remove User Created Petitions.

Occupy Our Homes shall have the right but not obligation in its sole discretion to screen and/or pre-screen User Content and/or Petitions provided or created by Users and shall have the right but not obligation to, at any time, refuse or remove any User Content and/or Petition for any reason whatsoever without justification, notice and/or explanation to you.

Without limiting the foregoing, Occupy Our Homes shall have the right to refuse or remove any User Content and/or Petition that it deems inappropriate and/or in violation of the terms of this TOS. The following is a partial list of the kind of User Content and/or User Created Petition that is prohibited by this Site, regardless of whether such User Content and/or Petition is illegal. By way of illustration, but not limitation, you may not take any action or upload, post, email, link or otherwise transmit or create any User Content and/or Petition that, within Occupy Our Homes' sole judgment:

infringes upon or violate any third party rights, including intellectual property rights, privacy rights or publicity rights of others, including posting or providing links to unauthorized copies of another party's copyrighted work;

promotes and/or encourage illegal or unlawful activity in any country;

is defamatory, libelous or slanderous in nature;

advocates hate, violence, abuse, threats or harm against any group, individual or entity;

harasses or encourage others to harass any group, individual or entity;

violates any right or duty under any law or under contractual or fiduciary relationships (such as inside information, proprietary and confidential information learned or disclosed as part of employment relationships or under nondisclosure agreements);

is patently offensive under a community standard that we deem appropriate, examples include promoting racism, bigotry, pornography hatred or physical harm of any kind; or

is inconsistent with the goals, objectives, philosophies, and/or purpose of Occupy Our Homes.org.

Postings or Petitions that violate this provision may subject you to immediate removal of your User Content and/or Petition(s).

Occupy Our Homes reserves the right to reject or remove User Content and/or Petition(s) at any time for any reason and without notice to you, if it believes, in Occupy Our Homes' sole judgment, that your User Content and/or Petition(s) is inappropriate and/or in violation of the terms of this Agreement.

You retain copyright and other intellectual property rights in and to user content created by you (“User Content”), to the extent that you have such rights under applicable law

Notwithstanding the foregoing, you understand and agree that by submitting your User Content to any area of the Site, you automatically grant (and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant) to Occupy Our Homes: (a) a royalty-free, world-wide, fully paid-up, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive right and license to (i) use, reproduce, distribute, modify, adapt, and publicly display your User Content within the Site and/or on the Service as permitted by you through your interactions on and through the Site, and (ii) use and reproduce (and to authorize third parties to use and reproduce) any of your User Content in any or all media throughout the world (b) the perpetual and irrevocable right to delete any or all of your User Contents from Occupy Our Homes’ servers and from the Site, whether intentionally or unintentionally, and for any reason or no reason, without any liability of any kind to you or any other party; and (c) a royalty- free, fully paid-up, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive right and license to copy, analyze and use any of your User Content as Occupy Our Homes may deem necessary or desirable for purposes of debugging, testing and/or providing support services in connection with the Site.

D. Third Party Intellectual Property Rights and Infringement

You may not incorporate into any User Content, or otherwise post on or through the site, any material, writing, visual work, audio work, audiovisual work, symbol, logo, trade name or data of any kind in which any third party has a copyright, trademark or other rights without obtaining the prior express written consent of the owner of such proprietary rights.

You acknowledge that Occupy Our Homes, users and other content providers have rights in their respective User Content under copyright and other applicable laws and treaty provisions, and that except as described in this TOS, such rights are not licensed or otherwise transferred by mere use of this Site. You accept full responsibility and liability for your use of any User Content in violation of any such rights.

You agree to indemnify and hold Occupy Our Homes harmless from and against all claims, costs, loss and damages of any kind (including reasonable attorneys fees and expenses) arising from or based upon any claim that any User Content posted or displayed on or through the Site by you infringes the copyright or intellectual property rights of any third party.

4. DMCA Policy

Occupy Our Homes respects the intellectual property rights of others and expects all Users of the Site to respect them as well. If you believe your copyrights or other intellectual property rights have been infringed or otherwise violated, please provide Occupy Our Homes' Copyright Agent the following information (your "Notice of Claim") via written letter, fax regular mail or email:

The signature (physical or electronic) of the person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of the copyright or other intellectual property interest;

a description of the copyrighted work or other intellectual property you claim has been infringed;

a description of where on the Site the material you claim is infringing is located;

your name, address, telephone number and email address;

a statement by you that you have a good faith belief that the disputed use is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent or the law;

a statement by you, made under penalty of perjury, that the above information in your Notice of Claim is accurate, and that you are the copyright owner or intellectual property owner, or are authorized to act on the copyright or intellectual property owner's behalf.

Occupy Our Homes' Copyright Agent for notice of claims of copyright or other intellectual property infringement can be reached as follows:

By mail:
Occupy Our Homes Copyright Agent

Risha Jamison, 5111 Telegraph Ave. Box #311, Oakland, CA 94609

At any time that Occupy Our Homes becomes aware that any User Content infringes the copyright of a third party, Occupy Our Homes will remove that User Content or Petition from the Site as required by laws. If you believe that Occupy Our Homes has removed any content in error and that you are the copyright owner of such content or have permission to use it, you can file a counter notice and let us know.

Any user of the site determined to have infringed the copyright of any third party on three or more occasions will have their access to the Site terminated. Users with suspended or terminated accounts are prohibited from using the Site.

Content Posted on the Site

Occupy Our Homes, unless otherwise indicated, does not guarantee the accuracy, integrity or quality of any content of the Site. You agree that you must evaluate, and bear all risks associated with, the use of any content, including any reliance on the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of such content.

Prohibited Uses of the Site

You have a nonexclusive, limited, revocable license to use the Occupy Our Homes Site while you are in compliance with this TOS. You agree to abide by certain rules of conduct and other rules prohibiting illegal and other practices that Occupy Our Homes deems harmful. We reserve the right to investigate and take appropriate legal action against anyone who, in Occupy Our Homes’ sole judgment, violates any of these terms, including without limitation, removing the offending communication from the Site and terminating the access of such violators.

You agree that you shall not use the Site to:

collect usernames and/or email addresses of Users or signers of Petitions for purposes other than those specifically intended on this Site;

forward personally identifiable information from any other User including any signer of a Petition;

upload, post, email or otherwise transmit any unsolicited or unauthorized advertising, or promotional materials, that are in the nature of "junk mail," "spam," "chain letters," "pyramid schemes," or any other form of solicitation that Occupy Our Homes considers in its sole discretion to be of such nature;

interfere with or disrupt the Site or servers or networks connected to the Site, or disobey any requirements, procedures, policies or regulations of networks connected to the Site;

attempt to gain access to any other User’s personal information, account or password;

post or provide links to information relating to circumventing this Site's or any other website's protected software; or

post links to expressly solicit personal information from anyone under the age of 18.

Any violation by you of the terms of the foregoing provisions may result in immediate and permanent suspension or cancellation of your access to the Site. You agree that Occupy Our Homes may take whatever steps it deems necessary to abridge, or prevent behavior of any sort on the Site in its sole discretion, without notice to you.

No Liability

You agree that Occupy Our Homes is not responsible for the conduct, whether online or offline, of any user of the Site or User. Occupy Our Homes assumes no responsibility for any error, omission, interruption, deletion, defect, delay in operation or transmission, communications line failure, theft or destruction or unauthorized access to, or alteration of, User communications. Occupy Our Homes is not responsible for any problems or technical malfunction of any telephone network or lines, computer systems, servers or providers, computer equipment, software, failure of email or players on account of technical problems or traffic congestion on the Internet or at any Site or combination thereof, including injury or damage to Users or to any other person's computer related to or resulting from participating or downloading materials in connection with the Site. Under no circumstances will Occupy Our Homes be responsible for any loss or damage, including but not limited to personal injury or death, resulting from anyone's use of the Site, any User Content posted on the Site or transmitted to Users, or any interactions between Users of the Site, whether online or offline. The Site and any services, tools or applications offered through the Site (the “Services”) are provided "AS-IS" and (to the extent legally permitted) Occupy Our Homes expressly disclaims any warranty of fitness for a particular purpose or non-infringement, and further expressly disclaims any implied warranty and terms and conditions. Occupy Our Homes cannot guarantee and does not promise any specific results from use of the Site and/or the Services.

Except where restricted or prohibited, in no event will Occupy Our Homes be liable to you or any third person for any indirect, consequential, exemplary, incidental, special or punitive damages, including lost profits arising from your use of the Site even if Occupy Our Homes has been advised of the possibility of such damages.

Release

You hereby agree to release Occupy Our Homes and its officers, directors, agents and employees from claims, demands, and damages (actual and consequential) of every kind and nature, known and unknown, arising out of or in any way connected with your use of the Site.

Indemnity

You hereby agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Occupy Our Homes and its officers, directors, agents and employees, from all damages, liabilities, claims and expenses, including without limitation attorneys' fees and costs, arising from any breach of this TOS by you, or from or based on your use of the Site and, any action or inaction by you in connection with the deletion, alteration, transfer or other loss of User Content or Petition(s), status or other data.

Claims or Disputes

If there is any claim, controversy or dispute at law or equity about this TOS, the Site and/or the Services ("Claim"), you agree that we will resolve any Claim in accordance with this paragraph. This TOS will be governed in all respects by the laws of the State of California as they apply to TOSs entered into and to be performed entirely within California between California residents, without regard to conflict of law provisions. You agree that any Claim must be resolved by a court located in California. You agree to submit to the personal jurisdiction of the courts located within the State of California for the purpose of litigating all Claims.